green unionism

By Maggie Trowe - The Militant, September 14, 2015; image by Jon Flanders

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Railroad Workers United will sponsor a one-day conference titled “Railroad Safety: Workers, Community and the Environment” Sept. 19 in Chicago. The RWU is organizing the event with labor and environmental groups, including United Steelworkers Local 1527, Frack Free Illinois and the Southeast Environmental Task Force. It is a follow-up to earlier conferences in Richmond, California, and Olympia, Washington.

“The 2013 Lac-Mégantic disaster put a spotlight on how rail bosses put profits ahead of safety and made these conferences necessary and possible,” Mark Burrows, a steering committee member of Railroad Workers United and delegate in SMART TD Local 1433 union, told the Militant in a phone interview Sept. 1.

On July 6, 2013, an unmanned runaway 72-car Montreal, Main and Atlantic train carrying volatile crude oil derailed and exploded in downtown Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killing 47 people, destroying the downtown area and dumping millions of gallons of oil into the soil and lake there. The catastrophe commanded worldwide attention and spurred concern about the dangers posed by the massive increase of North American oil production and its transport by train through the centers of cities and towns across the continent.

By Cam Fenton - Waging Nonviolence, September 3, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

More than 10,000 gathered in Toronto on July 5 for the largest and most diverse climate mobilization in Canadian history. (Project Survival / Robert van Waarden)

Earlier this summer I helped to organize the March for Jobs, Justice & the Climate — an action that brought more than 10,000 people to the streets of Toronto in one of the largest and most diverse climate mobilizations in Canadian history. More than 100 organizations supported the march — from national environmental groups to labor unions to the indigenous rights’ movement Idle No More to Toronto-based groups tackling poverty, food justice and migration. It was, as Naomi Klein put it, the “first steps of a new kind of climate movement” that reached beyond the traditional boundaries of the environmental movement.

The march was a “big tent” approach to climate organizing being put to practice, the same approach that helped the People’s Climate March bring over 400,000 people to the streets of New York City last September. It’s also an approach that we’re seeing gain more momentum in the lead-up to the Paris climate talks this December. In fact, another round of People’s Climate actions are already being planned for later this year.

Whether it’s called a big tent, intersectional organizing or building a “movement of movements,” this approach is key to the kind of transformative change required for solving the climate crisis. It’s also clear that it’s not an approach that’s going away any time soon.

During the organizing of the March for Jobs, Justice & the Climate, I learned a lot of hard lessons about the strengths and limitations of the big tent. In so doing, it became clear to me that the climate movement is struggling with this style of organizing, and that if we hope to build transformative power across and beyond social movements it’s going to take a lot more than just one big tent.

By ReelNews - YouTube, August 10, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Don't believe the lies from London Undeground management - this strike is about safety and work-life balance, as all four tube unions take unprecedented joint action against the imposition of night tube shifts which will endanger passengers and drastically reduce the time workers can spend with their family and friends.

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, September 6, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• This Labor Day Instead of Taking the Day Off, Work for Justice for Farm Workers! - By staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, September 3, 2015
• When Did the Anthropocene Begin…and Why Does It Matter? - By Ian Angus, Monthly Review, September 2015
• My Work: Railroad Workers United - By J.P.Wright, Railroad Music, August 24, 2015
• Coal's Devastation - By Robinson Meyer, The Atlantic, August 12, 2015

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Flood the System - Fall 2015: Flood, blockade, occupy and shut down the systems that jeopardize our future! | #FloodTheSystem
• Northern California Climate Mobilization - November 21, 2015
• People's Climate Movement - October 14, 2015
• People’s Climate Strike - November 26 - December 12, 2015
• Railcon15 - Chicago, Illinois Saturday, September 19, 2015 | #Railcon15
• Trade Union Climate Summit - September 14 & 15, 2015 Paris | #unions4climate
• 21st Century EcoSocialism Conference - October 9-11, 2015, University of California Santa Barnara 

Bread and Roses:

• Report Back Of International Week of Action - By staff, Boycott Sakuma Berries, September 3, 2015
• Peasant agriculture is a true solution to the climate crisis - By Josie Riffaud, Edgardo Garcia, and Carlos Marentes, La Via Campesina, September 3, 2015
• European Dairy crisis: Demonstration during the extraordinary Agriculture Council meeting on Monday, the 7th of September - By European Coordination, La Via Campesina, September 1, 2015
• ‘Not gone away’: Tens of thousands rally in Irish capital against water charges - By staff, Russia Times, August 29, 2015
• ILWU supports Sakuma workers - By staff, ILWU Dispatcher, August 3, 2015

An Injury to One is an Injury to All:

• Pittsburgh Company Craigslist Post: Looking for Scabs to Work 84 Hours/Wk. During Lockout - By Zaid Jilani, In These Times, September 2, 2015
• NUMSA mourns the death of those who perished in road accidents in the Eastern Cape - By Phumzile Nodongwe, NUMSA, September 1, 2015
• Stillwater miners working under imposed contract, NLRB investigates complaint - By MTN News, KTVQ, September 1, 2015
• Another Powerful Explosion at Chemical Factory in China - By Jennifer Baker, Revolution News, August 31, 2015
• 'Harperman' Protest Song Gets Performer Suspended from Job - By staff, VOCM, August 31, 2015

Carbon Bubble:

• ION Geophysical to cut 25 percent of workforce - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, September 2, 2015
• Canada’s Penn West to cut workforce 35 percent, slash spending - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, September 1, 2015; [related] Penn West will scrap dividend, fire one-third of its workers - By Bloomberg, FuelFix, September 1, 2015
• ConocoPhillips to cut 10 percent of global workforce - By Collin Eaton, FuelFix, September 1, 2015
• Alberta has lost 35,000 oilpatch jobs, petroleum producers say - By Tracy Johnson, CBC News, August 31, 2015
• Fossil Fools - By Branden Adams, The New Inquiry, August 31, 2015
• Canada’s driverless oilsands trucks; and the threat of big layoffs - By Geoffrey Morgan, Financial Post, June 8, 2015

Just Transition:

• No union mines left in Kentucky, where labor wars once raged - By Dylan Lovan, Associated Press, September 5, 2015
• The California state legislature just passed a coal divestment bill; what will this mean for the global divestment movement? - By Brett Fleishman, 350.org, September 4, 2015
• California forces pensions funds to divest from coal, but Future Fund digs in - By Sam Parkinson, REnew Economy, September 3, 2015
• California Passes Bill To Force Two Biggest Pension Funds To Divest From Coal - By Joshua S. Hill, Clean Technica, September 3, 2015
• California state pension funds to divest from coal - By Megan Darby, Responding to Climate Change, September 3, 2015
• The Nation’s Most Populous State Just Voted To Divest From Coal - By Katie Valentine, Think Progress, September 3, 2015
• California Assembly Votes to Divest Public Pension Funds From Coal - By Brett Fleishman, Kevin de León, and Claire Conlon, Fossil Free USA, September 2, 2015
• Stronger Climate Regulations Make Their Way to State Assembly - By Michael Krasny, KQED, September 2, 2015
• Fight to preserve Blair Mountain, labor history, continues - By Paul J. Nyden, Charleston Gazette-Mail, August 24, 2015

Other News:

• New Manatee Safeguards Need to be Strengthened; Inadequate Enforcement Unless Refuge Adopts Video Monitoring System - By Kirsten Stade, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, September 3, 2015
• Shell Arctic Offshore Safety Data Still Under Wraps; Specifics Bolstering President’s Assurance Cannot Be Produced until after Drilling - By Kirsten Stade, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, September 3, 2015
• Over 1,000 Arrested in Bengal Amid Violence During Trade Unions’ Countrywide Strike - By Kolkata, Kochi, Hyderabad, Nagpur, and Chandhigarh, The Times of India, September 3, 2015
• Tactical Response to Incidents Involving Crude Oil - By Robert Burke, Firehouse, September 1, 2015

For more green news, please visit our news feeds section on ecology.iww.org; Twitter #IWWEUC; Hashtags: #greenunionism #greensyndicalism #IWW

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, September 3, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Ten years ago, between August 23-31, Hurricane Katrina overran the city of New Orleans, Louisiana, destroying major portions of the city, killing at least 1245 people. The destruction and death disproportionately affected the poor, mostly nonwhite, working class people and neighborhoods of New Orleans, and the response by the capitalist class and every government from the local municipal authorities to the State of Louisiana to the United States, was to render aid to the mostly white employing class while letting the working class suffer. Law enforcement and the capitalist, in an orgy of racism and class bias, displayed blatant double standards, greatly exaggerating the actions of black survivors, labeling their actions as "violent", "looting", and "thuggish" while ignoring at least as serious actions by white survivors. Then, they used the disaster to bust unions, privatize public institutions (including the public school system), and shred environmental laws, so they could remake New Orleans into a hyper capitalist mecca. Ten years later, the devastation of Katrina is still wreaking havoc on the 99%, however, as a result, broad based, intersectional working class resistance has arisen among them and they are fighting back. A good portion of the resistance is working under the banner of #GulfSouthRising and Katrina Truth. Following are just some of their stories:

• Amid Katrina Commemoration Spectacle, a Southern Freedom Movement Takes Shape - By Anna Simonton, TruthOut, September 1, 2015
• Bush Administration Exemption Allowed Contractors To Steal Wages From Katrina Reconstruction Workers - By Esther Yu-Hsi Lee, Think Progress, August 31, 2015
• Dodging potholes in New Orleans: 10 years after Katrina - By Hannah Bonne, RoarMag, August 31, 2015
• Social Justice and Climate Justice Movements Merge in New Orleans 10 Years After Hurricane Katrina - By Julie Dermansky, DeSmog Blog, August 31, 2015
• Still left behind in the new New Orleans - Larry Bradshaw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky interviewed by Elizabeth Schulte, Socialist Worker, August 31, 2015
• Gulf South Rising Remembers Katrina, Builds Campaign - By Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, Popular Resistance, August 30, 2015
• How the Ruling Class Remade New Orleans - By Thomas Jessen Adams, Jacobin, August 29, 2015
• These New Orleans Residents Are Still Trying To Go Home - By Bryce Covert, Think Progress, August 29, 2015
• Change Everything or Face A Global Katrina - By Naomi Klein, This Changes Everything, August 28, 2015
• Katrina Plus Ten: Climate Justice in Action - By Scott Parkin, CounterPunch, August 28, 2015
• Shock Doctrine: A Look at the Mass Privatization of NOLA Schools in Storm’s Wake & Its Effects Today - Wendell Pierce and Gary Rivlin interviewed by Juan González and Amy Goodman, Democracy Now, August 28, 2015
• Ten years on: Katrina, militarisation and climate change - By Nick Buxton and Ben Hayes, Open Democracy, August 28, 2015
• Was the Katrina Oil Spill Disaster a Harbinger for the Atlantic Coast? - By Sue Sturgis, Facing South, August 28, 2015
• Still Waiting for Help: Lessons of Hurricane Katrina on Poverty - By Laura Lein, The Conversation, August 27, 2015
• A Decade After Katrina, RNs Reflect on What We’ve Learned and Refuse to Learn - By Staff, National Nurses United, August 26, 2015

For more green news, please visit our news feeds section on ecology.iww.org; Twitter #IWWEUC; Hashtags: #greenunionism #greensyndicalism #IWW

By various - Global Climate Jobs Network, September 2015

We have to stop climate change, and we have to do it quickly. To do it, we will need 120 million new jobs globally for at least twenty years.

There are now campaigns in several countries fighting for mass government programs for climate jobs. Most of them started with union support, and all of them are trying to build an alliance of unions, environmentalists, NGOs, and faith groups.This booklet has been produced by several of these campaigns, because we want people in other countries to do the same.

The first half of this booklet explains the idea of climate jobs in broad strokes. But each country is different, so the second half of this booklet sketches what climate jobs would mean in South Africa, Norway, Canada, New York State, and Britain.

Read the report (English PDF) | (French PDF) | (Spanish PDF).

Compiled by x344543 - IWW Environmental Unionism Caucus, September 1, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

The following news items feature issues, discussions, campaigns, or information potentially relevant to green unionists:

Lead Stories:

• The Colonial Origins of Conservation: The Disturbing History Behind US National Parks - By Stephen Corry, Truthout, August 25, 2015; [related] The Forgotten History Of 'Violent Displacement' That Helped Create The National Parks - By Julian Brave NoiseCat, Huffington Post, August 26, 2015
• The King is Dead!: In Appalachia, the Coal Industry Is in Collapse, but the Mountains Aren't Coming Back - By Laura Gottesdiener, Tom Dispatch, August 24, 2015
• Tianjin Explosion Highlights Profits Over People - By Preeti Kaur, Telesur, August 23, 2015
• Washington first state to price carbon by popular vote? The obstacle course - By Patrick Mazza, Cascadia Planet, August 23, 2015
• The Secret History of Jaywalking: The Disturbing Reason It Was Outlawed; And Why We Should Lift the Ban - By Ravi Mangla, Salon, August 22, 2015

Ongoing Mobilizations:

• Flood the System - Fall 2015: Flood, blockade, occupy and shut down the systems that jeopardize our future! | #FloodTheSystem
• Northern California Climate Mobilization - November 21, 2015
• People’s Climate Strike - November 26 - December 12, 2015
• Railcon15 - Chicago, Illinois Saturday, September 19, 2015 | #Railcon15
• Trade Union Climate Summit - September 14 & 15, 2015 Paris | #unions4climate

Bread and Roses:

• The Pacific Coast Farmworker Rebellion - By David Bacon, The Reality Check, August 28, 2015
• How Lebanon's rubbish spurred a budding revolution - By Nour Samaha, Al Jazeera, August 26, 2015
• Trash or Treasure? How to Repurpose Would-Be Wasted Food to Feed the Hungry and Create Jobs - By Alex McKechnie, Drexel Now, August 26, 2015

An Injury to One is an Injury to All:

• Another Powerful Explosion at Chemical Factory in China - By Jennifer Baker, Revolution News, August 31, 2015
• Fracking-induced earthquakes could leave workers vulnerable, says geophysicist - By Betsy Trumpener, CBC News, August 27, 2015
• 2 crew members injured after pipeline ruptures in Gulf - Associated Press wire, FuelFix, August 27, 2015
• Union can hand out leaflets critical of bus system leaders, judge says - By John Agar, Michigan Live, August 27, 2015
• United Front welcomes conviction of the police who murdered Mido Macia - By John Appollis, Dinga Sikwebu, and Mazibuko Jara, NUMSA, August 26, 2015
• Railroads balk at making oil disaster plans public - By Tim Pugmire, MPR News, August 25, 2015
• Skepticism arrives with caulk removal at Malibu schools - By Chris Bashaw, Malibu Surfside News, August 25, 2015
• Local 6787 steelworker dies in fall at BH mill - By Staff, Chesterton Tribune, August 24, 2015
• When firefighters speak out on climate change, we ought to listen up - By Char Miller, The Guardian, August 24, 2015
• No Nooses in the Workplace! Daryle Washington IBT 350 Recology Worker Targeted For Exposing Hanging Noose Racist Incident - By Steve Zeltser, Transportworkers.Org, August 23, 2015
• Coroner identifies worker who died after accident at Beech Grove Amtrak facility - Staff Report, 13 WTHR, August 22, 2015
• Fracking Companies Put First Responder Lives at Risk by Refusing to Disclose Chemicals - Appeal, Dear President Obama, August 20, 2015
• 4,000 Prison Inmates Fighting California Wildfires For $2 Per Day - By Kit O'Connell, Mint News, August 18, 2015
• Skepticism arrives with caulk removal at Malibu schools - By Charles D. Ellison, The Root, August 17, 2015
• Spate of oil field deaths prompts new study of workplace hazards - By Jennifer Gollan, Reveal, August 14, 2015
• Interview with a Miner - By Rachael Charbonneau and John Newlands, Workers Struggle-Sudbury, August 2015

Just Transition:

• Canadian doctors divest from fossil fuels - By Jesse McLaren, Rabble.Ca, August 26, 2015
• Financial gatekeepers are blocking green investment - By Megan Darby, Responding to Climate Change, August 25, 2015
• No Gold, No Masters - Press Release, Beyond Europe, August 24, 2015
• Drawing a line in the sand: The movement victory at Ende Gelände opens up the road of disobedience for Paris - By laronceblog, The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination, August 23, 2015
• Review: Alternatives to Capitalism - By Heather Blakey, Red Pepper, August 2015
• Review: The Collapse of Western Civilization - By Jonathan Cohn, Great Transition Initiative, August 2015
• Origins and delusions of green growth - By Gareth Dale, International Socialist Review, Summer 2015

Other News:

• NUMSA to also go for Prasa - By Andrew Chirwa, NUMSA, August 25, 2015
• Striking Chilean miners blockade themselves underground - By Staff, Khabar.Eu, August 25, 2015
• The 350.org and Hollaback! approach to distributed campaigning - By Tom Liacas, Mob Lab, August 4, 2015
• America’s First Red Scare: For many of its ideologues, a slaveholding Confederacy was meant to be a bulwark against radical politics of all stripes - By Andre Fleche, Jacobin, August 2015

For more green news, please visit our news feeds section on ecology.iww.org; Twitter #IWWEUC; Hashtags: #greenunionism #greensyndicalism #IWW

By Mark Gruenberg - People's World, August 26, 2015

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are not the official position of the IWW (or even the IWW’s EUC) and do not necessarily represent the views of anyone but the author’s.

Rail workers scored a big safety win in California on August 21 as state lawmakers gave final approval to a bill mandating two-person crews on all freight trains.

The measure, pushed by the Teamsters and their California affiliates, the Rail Division of SMART - the former United Transportation Union - and the state labor federation, now goes to Gov. Jerry Brown, D-Calif., who is expected to sign it.

Rail unions nationwide have been pushing for the two-person crews while the rail carriers have been pushing for just one, an engineer. Several months ago, the head of one carrier, the Burlington Northern, advocated crewless freights.

The unionists told lawmakers presence of a second crew member would cut down on horrific crashes such as the one that obliterated downtown Lac-Megantic, Quebec, two years ago. Then, a runaway oil train crashed and exploded, killing 47 people. That train had only an engineer. There has been a string of similar U.S. accidents since, especially of oil-carrying trains. Recent oil train accidents were near Galena, Ill., Lynchburg, Va., and in West Virginia.

The proposed California statute requires trains and light engines carrying freight within the nation's largest state - home to one of every eight Americans - to be operated with "an adequate crew size," reported Railroad Workers United, a coalition of rank-and-file rail workers from SMART, the Teamsters and other unions.

The minimum adequate crew size, the bill says, is two. Railroads that break the law would face fines and other penalties from the state Public Utilities Commission. The commission supported the bill, SB730.